Archive for the ‘New Zealand’ tag

The name McLaren is forever etched into the annals of racing history, thanks in part to the company’s success in series like Can-Am (where its cars dominated, amassing 56 wins from 1966-1974) and Formula One (where the McLaren team has won eight constructor’s championships, 12 driver’s championships and some 182 races over 47 seasons). As amazing as those numbers are, the story of its founder, Bruce McLaren, is even more impressive.

Born in Auckland, New Zealand, in 1937, a battle with Perthes disease at age nine left Bruce McLaren with a damaged left hip and a pronounced limp. Perhaps it was this early battle that gave the young McLaren his indomitable spirit, but from an early age McLaren never seemed to accept the word impossible. Growing up in the family business, a service station, McLaren seemed possessed of an innate understanding of all things mechanical. With a father passionate about motorsports, it was inevitable that Bruce McLaren would eventually find himself behind the wheel of a racing car.

Bruce McLaren in his Austin 7 Ulster, with his father in the background. Image courtesy of the Bruce McLaren Trust.

Driving an Austin 7 Ulster rebuilt by his father, McLaren entered his first amateur race, a hillclimb, at age 14. Two years later, competition license in hand, the young New Zealander was still driving a highly modified Austin 7, but soon progressed from production cars to open-wheel race cars. By 1957, at age 19, Bruce McLaren was well on the way to proving his talent behind the wheel of a Formula 2 Cooper-Climax, which McLaren himself had modified for better performance.

McLaren’s effort in the 1958 New Zealand Grand Prix was impressive enough to catch the eye of the New Zealand International Grand Prix organizers, who chose him as the first “Driver to Europe” scholarship award winner. Partnered with friend and mechanic Colin Beanland, McLaren found a home at the Cooper Works, building and modifying the firm’s F2 cars. McLaren’s first standout moment came at the 1958 German Grand Prix, which combined the F1 and F2 classes into a single race; driving a Cooper F2 car, McLaren finished fifth overall and first in the F2 class, marking his debut win at the sport’s highest levels against some of its best drivers.

The following year, McLaren was invited to drive for the Cooper F1 team, alongside rising F1 star Jack Brabham. In his very first season, McLaren picked up a podium finish in Great Britain, before going on to a win at the United States Grand Prix, making him the youngest driver (at age 22 years and 80 days) to do so at the time. Though Jack Brabham would take the F1 championship in 1959, McLaren accumulated enough points to finish in sixth place.

McLaren stayed with the Cooper F1 team through the 1965 season, becoming the team’s star driver upon Brabham’s departure in 1962. Though McLaren scored the occasional win or podium finish driving for Cooper, championships eluded him, and McLaren began looking beyond the boundaries of Formula One, as well as beyond the boundaries of driving for someone else. In 1963, McLaren started his own Tasman series racing team, Bruce McLaren Motor Racing, but that still wasn’t enough to satisfy him.

Perhaps McLaren’s experiences at engineering school persuaded him that there was more to a winning race car than just horsepower, or perhaps it was his drive to take the status quo and make it just a bit better. Whatever the reason, Bruce McLaren created McLaren Racing, Limited, in 1966, with a focus on building both sports racing cars (like the M1A, constructed in 1964) and competitive Formula 1 cars.

As if this wasn’t already enough on his plate, McLaren delivered a win for Ford (driving with Chris Amon) in the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans, driving a Ford GT40 Mk. II. The following year, partnered with Mario Andretti, he’d deliver a second win at the 12 Hours of Sebring, driving a GT40 Mk. IV.

As the 1960s came to a close, McLaren spent his time building and campaigning cars in Formula One, where he finished third in points during the 1969 season, as well as in the newly formed Canadian-American Challenge series, more commonly known as Can-Am. Though the 1966 Can-Am season saw McLaren finish third in points, with four podium finishes to his credit, things would change in 1967.

At Le Mans, 1967. Photo courtesy Ford Motor Company.

To say that Bruce McLaren Motor Racing dominated the 1967 Can-Am season is a gross understatement, as the team won five of six rounds that year. Bruce McLaren easily took home the championship, while teammate Denny Hulme finished in second position, just three points behind. The following year, 1968, saw Can-Am wins from Roger Penske Racing and John Cannon, but Hulme still brought home the title for the McLaren team. Though McLaren’s performance in the 1967 season seemed unbeatable, the team achieved the near-impossible for the 1969 Can-Am season, sweeping the series with wins in 11 out of 11 races. At season-end, Bruce McLaren had racked up 165 points, compared to teammate Hulme’s 160 points; the next-closest competitor, Chuck Parsons, had amassed just 85 points.

As dominant as McLaren’s M8B Can-Am car had proven in the 1969 series, Bruce McLaren was never one to rest on past accomplishments. For 1970, the plan was to roll out a new chassis, dubbed the M8D, which promised to deliver yet another winning year for the team. On June 2, 1970, less than two weeks away from the opening of the 1970 Can-Am season, Bruce McLaren was testing the M8D at Britain’s Goodwood Circuit when the rear bodywork separated from the car at speed. The sudden loss of downforce caused the car to spin and impact a flag stand, killing McLaren instantly.

In celebration of its 50th anniversary in 2013, McLaren Automotive released a speculative but moving video, depicting the post-crash spirit of Bruce McLaren thinking back on his life and accomplishments. In it, McLaren utters the words used to eulogize his former teammate, Timmy Mayer, but they are, perhaps, most fitting when applied to McLaren’s own life.

“To do something well is so worthwhile that to die trying to do it better cannot be foolhardy. Indeed, life is not measured in years alone, but in achievement.”

At first glance to an American, it’s just a plain-jane everyday Fifties four-door Plymouth with its steering wheel on the wrong side. But to a New Zealander, this 1952 Plymouth Cranbrook for sale on Hemmings.com is a car worthy of a bare-metal restoration and subsequent high level of maintenance. From the seller’s description:

This car has no rust whatsoever and Body is perfect. Paint is perfect. Chrome is perfect.

About fifteen years ago, car was stripped to bare metal and restored. Leather Seats were redyed and new carpet was done at the same time. All the rubbers, trims, external trim are like new. The interior is faultless and doesn’t have the slightest imperfection. The mechanics are perfect, it doesn’t use oil, water or drip any fluids. It also sounds fabulous and drives incredibly well.

Car has been converted to 12volt, includes well hidden stereo, new steering box, new shocks, stainless exhaust and alarm system.

Maintained regardless of cost, this car is in immaculate condition throughout having been very well cared for all its life. It would be hard to see or find another example like it. Price firm and in New Zealand dollars.

It almost seems incongruous to think of American Motors – that company so immersed in the red, white and blue that it adopted the color scheme for its race cars and for its logo – as exporting its products all over the globe, but Kenosha did indeed pursue export programs beyond North America, including to Australia, South Africa and Germany, often using partner companies to assemble knock-down versions of its cars. Indeed, that’s the case with the above right-hand drive 1968 Ambassador SST, photos of which Eddie Stakes forwarded to us from owner Greg Lees in New Zealand.

This 1973 Pierre Cardin Javelin that Eddie alerted us to, however, took a different route to a foreign land. While Eddie noted that AMC offered generous discounts to U.S. military personnel and often placed dealership close to military bases, owner Hasim Selçuk of Kayseri, Turkey, said its original owner, an engineer, actually imported the Javelin from the U.S. or Canada to Iraq when it was just a year old. Its second owner brought took it to Iraq and then sold it last year to Hasim, who recently finished a four-month restoration, using the Javelin’s original interior, original 401-cu.in. V-8, and repainting it in the stock F3 Fresh Plum.

Hats off to both Greg and Hasim, for taking on restorations of cars that are hard enough to get parts for here in the United States!

I see that my recent posts all lack in color. So what to do? Post pictures of Australian cars, all taken in New Zealand by our pal Jaffa at some All-Australian Car Day in New Zealand. Above, Jaffa’s daughter covers her ears against the noise from a 1972 Ford Falcon XA coupe’s exhaust.

I think Jaffa likes XAs. Here’s a 1972 Fairmont.

And a 1972 Falcon

But then he threw us a curveball with this killer 1976 Holden Torana SL/R 5000.

Whaddaya say, folks? Want to see more Jaffa photos? I want to see more of that Torana.

I’ve still got the scars from my childhood explorations into the melting point of copper, and to this day it’s my material of choice when the need to bend some metal strikes. I’m not the only one, with copper choppers and hotrod detail work showing up among those who don’t mind a streak of green here and there.

New Zealand’s Southward Car Museum is, as are many car museums, the bequest of a single man, and as such, an eclectic reflection of his tastes. In this case, Sir Len Southward, who clearly dug the prewar jazz.

There’s only a sketch of the 250-car collection, and it includes a single small photo and a single paragraph on something it calls “The Dodge Copper Car:”

This remarkable car body was handbeaten out of copper by Mr Philip Lewis of Auckland in 1921. Mr Lewis bought a new Dodge in 1920 and then transformed it by adding new bodywork beaten out of copper and brass. The bodywork took 1000 hours to complete and the car made its debut in the Queen Street Christmas Eve Parade of 1921 in Auckland.

I couldn’t learn anything else about it, and only turned up a couple other photos on the internets, from a German Oltimer fan’s field trip.

It’s a baroque masterpiece, and no matter how thin the sheathing is, must weigh two tons or better. I’m going out on a limb and guessing that despite it’s antipodean origins, with the snake head horn, it’s got to be called “Copperhead.” Next time anyone’s in NZ, bring us back some better pics, OK? And tell us more about the thing just called “Dragster,” too..

“Powered by an Allison V1710 aircraft engine, the 12 cylinder motor of 1710 cu in (28,027cc) develops 1400 bhp at 3000 rpm. Fitted with a Stromberg injection carburettor, the engine is from a Kittyhawk P40 fighter plane.”

Oh, look, it’s snowing here. Good thing Jaffa sent us more New Zealand car show pictures, this time from the recent Rangiora car show. It seems Rangiora had more power parking than hoonage, but the burnout contest still managed to fill the air with white smoke.

When it’s negative frostbite out, we don’t really think much about car shows here in Vermont. In New Zealand, though, their show season is in full swing. One of the wildest kiwi shows is the Full Throttle Auto X show in Christchurch, well known for its hoonage, burnouts, bikinis and drifting. While there was an element of power parking, our new buddy Dave “Jaffa” Smith sent us a ton of photos, mostly of cars engulfed in thick white smoke.